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Welcome to this week’s edition of Dear Zio Aunt Sally.
Today’s question comes from a particularly unfortunate breed of confused American Jew who, as far as I can work out, loves Israel but hates himself for doing so.
So if anyone else finds themselves in a similar predicament, hopefully this will help you!
PS. This is purely for entertainment purposes, and maybe a little bit of education too.
Dear Aunt Sally,
Recently my organisation, a pro-Israel, pro-peace, pro-democracy advocacy group, paid a couple of thousand dollars for an exhibit table at the College Democrats of America convention. Unfortunately we were subsequently attacked online for co-sponsoring the event, all because a very anti-Israel speaker, Hasan Piker, was speaking there.
I feel really picked on by my fellow Jews. This is an ongoing pattern, even though we’re on their side… and also everyone else’s since we are also pro-Palestine, and believe in equal rights, a two-state solution and that the IDF trains dogs to do something biology hasn’t yet caught up with. We chose to take part in this event because we, like many American Jews including those who are now being unkind to us, are left wing. I choose to believe that the left is inherently good, fair, and willing to listen to all voices, including our very balanced view that Israel should exist and so should a democratic Palestinian state.
We had no choice over who would be speaking, nor do we endorse nor agree with what Hasan Piker says or how he says it. But we feel it’s our duty to keep showing up rather than allowing the most polarizing voices in politics to shape what Democrats stand for. What can I do to convince my fellow Jews that I am right?
In gratitude,
An anonymous CEO of a major Jewish org.
Dear Anonymous,
I hear your pain, and it is absolutely right to keep showing up – in the right way. But the questions that come to mind are: what is the right way, and is it really necessary to also offer funding that supports speakers whose views you disagree with?
Tell me something: given the way you have made crystal clear to me that you neither endorse nor agree with the speaker in question, does that not tell you that perhaps you understand implicitly that there is something really quite wrong with that speaker, whose beliefs are in fact fundamentally opposed to your own, being allowed to speak at an event? An event that you are also showing your presence at, and are helping to fund? That while you insist it’s not the event itself but the choice of speaker, one that chooses to platform a speaker you have to make such a point of disassociating from might be barking up the wrong palm tree?
In which case, why the hell are you giving it your dollars and presence? In the name of peace? Really? In the name of democracy and freedom of speech? Despite the fact that the speaker in question directly opposes the freedom of a specific nation to exist — the one you say you support, which he continually insists is a “fascist settler-colonial apartheid state” — and uses language that directly opposes peace by inciting violence against one specific identity: the Jewish identity, which also happens to be your own. He also blames people just like you for that very violence and has postured as pro-Hamas when choosing between Hamas and Israel. Not ‘Palestinians’ and Israel, but very specifically Hamas. And I quote,
“Hamas is a thousand times better than a fascist settler-colonial apartheid state.”
“I stand by that.” — RealClearPolitics
So back to the question of choosing to show up rather than not, perhaps your fellow American Jews are not “picking” on you but, in fact, berating you for choosing to show up in a way that implies solidarity with the speaker. Many understand that distancing oneself from evidently hostile groups and individuals does not mean you aren’t showing up. Indeed, you could choose to show up in a way in which your presence won’t be overlooked by antizionist propaganda, as in, not supporting an event that is specifically choosing to platform bigotry that opposes Jewish rights to live free of persecution.
I get that you want to be seen as nice, moderate, non-divisive, and entirely balanced. You say you believe a democratic Palestinian state should exist yet you fail to mention that not a single political group leading Palestinians has ever shown a desire to do so democratically. So I’d like to share a little nugget of wisdom I have gained over the years: it’s much more honest, balanced, and real to say things as they are, to accept that being ‘left wing’ does not automatically make one fair minded or decent, to call out hypocrisy and bigotry, and to not just meekly hand over your money and “show up” because, y’know, democracy and all that.
I read many articles from The Guardian, but I will never give it a penny of my hard-earned Substack subscriptions, because they cuddle up with Al Jazeera and platform Hamas propaganda without questioning any of it, which make them unequivocally undeserving of any support from me.
And I’d say that the College Democrats of America convention inviting Hasan Piker to speak makes them undeserving of yours. It’s not merely happenstance that they are choosing to platform someone with a huge anti-Israel following, who uses some of the most divisive rhetoric on the left and, incidentally, has explicitly blamed pro-Israel American Jewish organisations like your own for being the cause of rising antisemitism.
I’m sorry to say that everything points to the fact that they’re not interested in what you have to say, only your dollars, when the speaker with the largest following doesn’t believe Israel has the right to exist? And I quote,
“I think Israel, in its current formation, given that it’s a settler-colonial operation that’s seeking out the expulsion or complete extermination of the indigenous population, as an apartheid state, does not have a right to exist.” — Mediaite
Yet, like the nice Jewish boy you were raised to be, you paid them obediently and justified doing so with references to “free speech” and “democracy”. And then showed up to be the pro-Israel presence at an evidently anti-Israel event.
My advice? Stop being a nice Jewish boy. You’re far too old for that. Your mother didn’t put herself through the torture of hearing your pained scream at eight days’ old only to see you still in diapers now. It’s time to pull up your big boy pants and get with the times. This is 1930, I mean 2026, and Jews can’t just keep handing the Jizya tax over to our haters with some delusional idea that it’s all in the name of peace. Hasan Piker wastes no words when he says what he thinks of Israel…and of you. Stop wasting yours.
Grow a spine. You say you’re pro-Israel, so prove it. Calling out the truth about antizionist bigotry does not mean you don’t care about Palestinian rights. On the contrary, it shows you’re willing to stand up for what is right, including all rights of everyone to live in dignity and allow others to do so too, even if the antizionist nutjobs tell you otherwise. Spoiler: they don’t know shit.
If you really want to support Palestinians to live prosperous and dignified lives then you need to stop subscribing to the rhetoric of the antizionists, and instead lobby for fundamental change within Palestinian society, as well as within Israeli politics. There are many brilliant people already doing this work, like Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, who had his own take on the event you co-sponsored:
Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib@afalkhatib
Some of the messaging coming out of the College Democrats of America @CollegeDems convention in Washington, DC (the college arm of the Democratic National Committee) reflects a party drifting toward far‑left positions while advancing increasingly incoherent core platforms.
4:58 AM · Jul 19, 2026 · 98.6K Views
94 Replies · 295 Reposts · 1.59K Likes
Finally, you asked what you can do to convince your fellow Jews that you’re right. Here’s my answer to that:
Apologise for supporting antizionist propagandists. Be a Zionist and be proud to be one.
Because whatever anyone else says about Zionism, if you’re pro-Israel you’re a Zionist — it’s the very definition. It doesn’t mean you are racist against Palestinians, or a supremacist. It just means you support Israel’s right to exist and for Jews to self-determine, which does not negate the right of Palestinians to self-determine. It’s only when Palestinians decide they can’t do so while simultaneously allowing Israelis to live in peace, or to live at all, that Zionism gets called out as the problem — basically, we’re only actually a problem to those who want to kill or subjugate us because we refuse to die or be subjugated. But quite honestly, as long as we are allowed to live with autonomy over our own lives, we are very happy to allow others to do the same. It’s really not that difficult to grasp.
Hope that helps.
With love,
Aunt Sally
PS. This letter and its response may or may not have been inspired by the following post:
Thanks for reading!
If you happen across any online Jewish fuckery that needs the Aunt Sally treatment, feel free to email me at auntsally777@gmail.com. You can also email me with your own questions.
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